Authors: Elle Boon
Hearing Hal mimic his thoughts about their search made his stomach drop. The other man didn’t have to add
or they were dead
; nothing could’ve survived in the middle of the area.
Keanu shook his head, not willing to give up yet. “This way, I know I’m right.” Turning toward the trees, he didn’t need to check to see if his partner followed.
Burnt wood and grass surrounded them. Inhaling deeply he caught a scent so distinctive it made most people gag.
“My water tank is almost empty. If there’s a fire, and I’m not saying there is, maybe we should call for back-up.”
“There isn’t time. I smell burnt human hair.”
“Shit,” Hal swore.
Keanu led them into a thick clump of charred trees. With all the blackness surrounding him, he couldn’t see a thing, but he sensed a hot spot. A tingling deep inside wouldn’t let him ignore what he knew was a real threat. He rushed to the area before coming to an abrupt halt. A large section of land filled with tall dry grass had started to smolder.
“What the fuck? How the hell did we miss this?” Hal pointed. “Look.”
A small boy was nestled in the branches just above the flames.
“Hal, you climb and I’ll take care of the fire,” Keanu ordered, relieved to see his partner and best friend didn’t argue for once.
Stepping over the fallen branches and blackened areas, he inhaled the hot air into his lungs. He continued sucking the flames into his body, relishing the feel of the warmth rushing through his system, while using the water hose attached to his pack to douse the hot spots.
By the time Hal had the boy on the ground, he couldn’t sense any more flames. He coughed and gave Hal two thumbs up.
They made their way back to their teammates with the small boy cradled in Hal’s big arms.
“What the hell?” Brax eyed the child.
Keanu grabbed a bottle of water from his coworker and chugged, while the rest of the group tended to the boy. His inner flame began to cool with the refreshing fluid and he accepted another bottle gratefully.
“Oh man, Kea. You saved the boy’s life.” Barry looked from the boy to Keanu.
Keanu shook his head. “Nah, I just got lucky. Hal got the kid down.”
“Bullshit! Good job, Kea.” Brax punched his arm.
Praise from his team made Keanu cringe. None of them were ordinary men, far from it, but he hated having attention drawn to him. He looked to the sky, happy to see their pick-up overhead in time to save him from unwanted admiration. They’d radioed ahead, alerting them to the addition. The first man took the child. Keanu was the last to leave the clearing. Giving his inner fire free reign one last time, he made sure they hadn’t missed anything else. By the time they finished, he was sure the next team wouldn’t have any surprises.
Getting into the DC-3 wasn’t nearly as fun as jumping from one, Keanu mused as he was finally lifted up.
* * * *
K
eanu stood on his deck gazing at the openness for as far as his eyes could see. He loved the smell of the mountains, the clean pine scent. It was very similar to his home with his grandparents. He raised his face to the sun, allowing the rays to warm him from the outside as his internal fire warmed the inside. Letting out a deep breath, he turned toward the fire pit in the corner and blew a puff of air on the logs, making them burn.
Smiling, Keanu stepped into his spacious kitchen and grabbed a bottle of beer from the fridge. Closing his eyes in bliss as he twisted off the cap, he tipped his head for a much needed drink. A platter of steaks and two potatoes wrapped in foil were on the counter, ready to be cooked. He grabbed the platter, stepped outside and placed them on the grill, then with another breath of air, the charcoals started to smoke and turn a fiery red.
“Yo, Kea. Where you at?” Hal yelled from inside.
“I'm on the deck. Grab a beer and come on out.”
Hal ducked his head, avoiding the doorjamb, and joined Keanu on the deck with two bottles dangling from his fingers. Keanu took a bottle from Hal with a shake of his head.
“Oofta, I so needed this.” Hal tipped his bottle to his mouth.
Keanu laughed and flipped the steaks. “Is ‘oofta’ a real word?”
“Hell yeah, it’s real. You can use it for just about any swear word.”
Keanu stifled a chuckle. “Thanks, but I think I’ll just say ‘fuck’ at least once in every sentence.”
“Why doesn’t that surprise me?”
“Fuck off.” Keanu laughed.
They sat in companionable silence, listening to the birds sing and the wind whistle through the trees. Keanu loved being outside almost as much as he loved women. He swore watching the trees sway was like watching a woman sashay as she led her man to bed.
“So, what did your grandfather want?”
Leave it to Hal to cut to the chase before Keanu was ready to talk about it. His grandfather lived at the top of the Cascades. It was only fifty miles away, but it could be another country.
Keanu shrugged. “Something is spooking him, and if you knew my grandfather, you’d know it was major. He scares the shit out of me and I’m a grown man.”
“He didn’t give you any hints?”
Keanu looked at the pit and sucked in a breath, making the red coals lose some of their glow, before turning to his best friend. “Nah. He needs my
expertise
.” Keanu made air quotes, shrugged, and headed to the grill.
“So, are you looking forward to going home, boss?” Hal asked.
“Yes and no.”
“We’re going to miss you on the team. Not sure what we’ll do without our very own fireman.” Hal laughed, his booming voice echoing in the still of the night.
“Real funny. I’m still on call in case of emergency situations, and you know Brax can bend things to his will.” Keanu raised his eyebrows. The co-leader of their group had truly amazing and sometimes frightening powers, but Keanu wasn’t going to tell him he thought he was great. The man already had a big head.
Keanu flipped the steaks and checked the potatoes.
“I’m going to miss my own personal barbeque-man.” Hal had a frown on his face.
He flipped Hal off. He’d had the ability to make a fire out of air since he was a small boy. By the time he’d turned twelve, he’d learned to breathe the fire back into his body without much cost to himself, other than the need to burn off the energy one way or another.
After graduating from high school he became a fireman for the local fire department. Known as a fire-breather in the world of elementals, Keanu could create a small flame or a large roaring blaze, and in the next breath suck it back into his body. Of course, the larger the fire the more energy he needed to burn afterwards.
As a child, he’d hike for miles and freefall off a cliff into the freezing streams surrounding the Cascades. The adult Keanu found other more pleasurable ways to expel the effects, usually between the thighs of a woman.
“You need some help there, Kea?”
Keanu shook off his thoughts of the past. “Could you grab the salad and dressing out of the fridge?”
“No problem.”
Within moments, Keanu had the steaks and potatoes on the table. It always amazed him the way the six foot four blond giant waited until everything was set before digging into his food. He’d slice his steak with exact precision into small cube-like bites, and then stab them with his fork, before chewing each piece several times.
Hal always consumed the meat first, then the carbs, followed by whatever was left, claiming he liked to eat the good stuff first. It amused Keanu to watch him. Being a man who loved his sweets, Keanu would skip the meal and eat dessert first when he could.
“Why are you staring at me like I’m some kind of lab experiment?” Hal asked.
Keanu shook his head, raised his fork and pointed it at his friend. “You are the weirdest eater.”
Hal raised his bottle. “I get no complaints from the ladies.”
“Thanks for the visual, dude.”
Ankles crossed, hands resting over his full belly, Keanu leaned his head on the back of his chair and stared at the darkening sky.
Hal kicked Keanu’s feet on the ottoman. With a grunt, Keanu made room for the other man to stretch out his long legs, too.
“Have you ever had the feeling your world was about to get rocked?” Keanu asked without looking at Hal.
“Yep! Every time I take a lady to bed.” Hal wagged his eyebrows.
“Shut up, dick,” he laughed. “I don’t mean like that. Besides, I don’t get my world rocked when I fuck a woman, I rock
her
world.” Keanu smirked.
“Man, you’re so full of it. I heard Cathy calling you all kinds of names and none of them good.” Hal punched Keanu’s arm.
“Damn, she’s one crazy-ass bitch. Seriously though, have you ever gotten a feeling nothing is gonna be the same again?” Keanu brought the conversation back around, avoiding the unwanted reminder of his ex.
Hal bumped his size fourteen feet against Keanu’s before answering. He felt like a pussy for voicing his fears.
“I don’t discount any mysterious crap. For real, my grandmother used to talk about the berserkers in my family, and how they came back every hundred years or some shit. I’m the first
blond giant
in over ten decades.” He gave Keanu a pointed look. “My Nana’s words, not mine. Sometimes, when I’m in the middle of a fire, I feel like another person is in my body. Ya know what I mean?” Color spread across Hal’s face.
Keanu knew exactly what he meant. Every member of their Smokejumper group had special abilities. Hal was clearly a human wrecking ball. He just hadn’t realized Hal wasn’t always in control, or didn’t feel like it at least. “I think we all feel like that to an extent. Have you talked to the captain about it?”
Hal pinned him with a look brooking no argument. “Nothing to talk about.”
They fell silent. Keanu let the quiet of the night soothe his soul. One of the reasons he and Hal were such good friends was because neither man pried into the other’s business.
“I’d better get going. You want me to help clean up?” Hal nodded at the dishes on the table.
“Nah, I got it.”
“Hey, I owe you for cooking, but I haven’t mastered the art of making anything other than Ramen noodles yet.”
Keanu blinked his eyes. “Because you have the poor little boy look down to an art. You bat those baby blues and all the ladies line up to cook for you.”
“Well, you just smile that bright cheesy-ass grin and the ladies are lining up to take their panties off for you. I think that trumps my free meals.”
Both men laughed at the familiar argument, since neither man lacked for food or companionship.
They were opposite in looks. Keanu had dark hair hanging past his shoulders, dark brown eyes, and topped out at six foot. Hal was built more like a swimmer, and had at least three inches on him. Keanu had the physique of a body builder and spent his off-time working out or participating in extreme sports.
Brax, the co-leader of his team of Smokejumpers, recruited Keanu at twenty-two when he’d made national headlines. Now at thirty-three, he was ready to head home and settle down. Being seven years older than Hal, he considered him like a little brother. As the unofficial leader of the team it was his job to watch over the guys, but he’d taken Hal under his wing. Knowing he’d possibly done his last jump, and he and Hal would no longer be working together, Keanu already missed his friend.
He walked Hal to the door and watched as the big man took the stairs two at a time, before jumping into his oversized four-wheel-drive pickup. Hal waved one big hand out the window before executing a U-turn to leave. Keanu waited until the taillights disappeared down the long drive before going inside. After cleaning up the mess, he shed his clothes and stood under the rainforest-like shower he’d installed on his deck. Sighing, he closed his eyes.
* * * *
C
ammie Masters loved the little town of McKinley Landing, and the way it was tucked into the side of the surrounding mountains. But, and this was a big but, she hated the way it had grown. The town used to be only thirty-eight hundred people. Since the pork plant had moved in, the population had almost doubled, and so had the crime.
Many of the residents of McKinley Landing were a mix of races, but she connected best with her mother’s Native American relatives. Her red hair was the only thing that was different. When she was a child, she’d played with the other kids and wished she’d had their black hair.
The summer Cammie had turned twelve, she'd fallen in love for the first time. She’d climbed one of the big pines bordering the Cascade forests and her shoe got stuck several feet up, between two branches. She thought back to the afternoon that changed her whole life with fondness.
“I’m a big girl. I am not gonna cry.” Cammie shivered, looking down at the ground from the tree she was stuck in. “Dang you, Mazey Otto,” Cammie whimpered.
Mazey called her a fire demon because of her red hair. When she told her it didn’t mean she was evil the other girl called her a liar. She hadn’t intended to hurt the brat, she’d only wanted her to shut up. It wasn’t her fault. Mazey was clumsy and fell down the stairs. Now everyone was calling her names, so she ran away.
Swiping at the tears dripping down her cheeks, she didn’t want to admit she was crying. Cammie tried to wiggle her foot free, but only made it worse. The sound of something crashing through the trees caused her to nearly jump out of her skin. From her viewpoint, something really big was running straight for the tree—for her.
Cammie held her breath, closed her eyes, and prayed whatever it was wouldn’t see her and decide she’d make a tasty snack. Her mama always said there were things in the forests that would kill and not to go into them. But Cammie loved the big pines, and the noises the animals made were her favorite sounds. Now, the wilderness seemed to stop and wait, like it knew a greater predator was in its midst.
The beat of her heart filled her ears. Cammie opened her eyes. Surely if the beast was hungry it would be growling or shaking the tree, right? Looking at the last place she’d seen the thing, she relaxed, or tried as much as she could with her arms wrapped around the trunk.